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The high cost of duty paid on imported pharmaceutical products has been identified as a major factor making access to basic medicines difficult for Nigerians.
Speaking during a visit by members of the Association of Hospital and Administrative Pharmacists of Nigeria to the office of World Wide Commercial Ventures Limited in Matori, Lagos, the Managing Director of the company, Mr. Ananth Narayan, said that the duty charged on pharmaceutical products had jerked prices up thereby making them unaffordable.
While identifying the lack of regular electricity supply in the country and the failure of retailers to pay on time for stocks delivered to them as among other factors contributing to the problem, Narayan said that if provided with needed infrastructure, the sector would not only pro

The Concerned Citizens of Nigeria, CCN, has called on President Muhammadu Buhari’s media team to disclose the details of the ailment he is suffering from and the kind of treatment being given to him to end the growing anxiety over the secrecy regarding the nature of his illness.
It also frowned at the attack on the Resume or Resign protesters, saying that the failure to arrest the attackers showed that they were being backed by superior authorities.
The group in a statement by the Messrs. Ikechukwu Ikeji, Ken Okolugbo, Turner Ogboru, Yunusa Tanko and Bala Zakka, said it was wrong for the President’s handlers to keep details of his illness in the dark more than 100 days after he left the country.
The statement reads: “We are however shocked and in total disbelief that for some curi

The World Health Organisation in its health index report for Nigeria in the year 2015, stated that the life expectancy for the country is currently at 53/56 years - for males to females respectively. If this discouraging statistics is anything to go by, it clearly confirms one thing – the needless incessant cases of sudden death in our environment could partly be a reason for this. In recent times our society has come under the siege of the devastating effects of cardiovascular diseases such as high blood pressure or hypertension, heart attack, stroke and even hypotension.
According to the World Health Organisation statistics, from the 2015 world Health Day reports, hypertension is responsible for an estimated 45 per cent of deaths from heart disease, and 51 per cent of deaths from stroke

At an interactive session during the just concluded Conference of the Association of Community Pharmacists of Nigeria (ACPN) in Jos, Plateau State, Pharm. Wale Oladigbolu stood out as perhaps a lone ranger in his nonconformist posture. He did not hesitate to make his feelings known as this subject matter came to the front burner. Oladigbolu who chairs the Rivers State Chapter of the Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria (PSN), cuts the image of an angry pharmaceutical health service provider as long as MAS is on the table; he is one who would not trade his reputation and sense of authority for anything in the world. As a result I made sure to probe deeper into his feelings as I accosted him after the session.
MAS, is the acronym for the process of confirming genuine pharmaceutical products or...

There is only one doctor attending to every 4,000 people in Kaduna state, a huge shortfall from recommendations by the World Health Organisation, doctors there have claimed.
Nigerian Medical Association in Kaduna says the stae has a total 2,000 practising physicians—consisting both public and private facilities and across all tiers of health care.
Kaduna has taken steps to bridge the gap by ensuring the state medical school gets accreditation to train doctors and recruiting more physicians.
But the challenge is internal brain drain, according to Abdulrahman Shehu, chairman of the association.
He address journalists at the Annual General Meeting and Scientific Conference of the NMA.
Doctors in state employ are constantly moving to federal institutions and neighbouring states i

The three doctors infected with Lassa fever have been discharged at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), Idi-Araba in Lagos.
This was made known to our reporters by the chairman, Medical Advisory Committee, Prof. Olufemi Fasanmade on Wednesday. The infected doctors were discharged because they’ve been confirmed free from the fever.
Fasanmade also assured Nigerians that Lassa fever will be forgotten in Nigeria, adding that “we have all its takes for the treatment.”
“We have other related issue with Lassa fever; over 50 people infected are likely to be discharged soon,” he added.
It will be recalled that three doctors were infected with Lassa fever at the LUTH and investigations revealed that three infected are resident’s doctors from the same department (Department of An

Plants have been “hijacked” to make polio vaccine in a breakthrough with the potential to transform vaccine manufacture, say scientists.
The team at the John Innes Centre, in Norfolk, says the process is cheap, easy and quick.
As well as helping eliminate polio, the scientists believe their approach could help the world to react to unexpected threats, such as Zika virus or Ebola.
Experts said the achievement was both impressive and important.
The vaccine is an “authentic mimic” of the poliovirus.
Outwardly it looks almost identical to the poliovirus, but – like the difference between a mannequin and person – it is empty on the inside.
It has all the features needed to train the immune system, but none of the weapons to cause an infection.
The scientists hijacked a relative o

It has been observed that there is a large pool of pharmacists in the academia, regulation, hospital, oil and gas, and financial sectors who are not optimally engaged as pharmacists.
Hence PCN has seen the need to engage such pharmacists through the satellite pharmacy concept.
In simple terms, a satellite pharmacy is defined as a pharmacy in an institution which provides specialised services for the patients of the institution, and which is dependent upon the centrally located pharmacy for administrative control, staffing, and drug procurement.
The major issue confronting pharmacy practice today is the presence of stark and worrisome gaps in knowledge of pharmacy as a service and product delivery practice.
Pharmaceutical Council of Nigeria (PCN) defines Satellite Pharmacy as a ...

Alexander Fleming’s discovery of Penicillin in 1928 did not only bring hope to the warring soldiers who might have had their legs or arms amputated following infection on their wounds, it also brought hope to the world at large that antibiotics was the future to tackle bacterial infections effectively. The risk of infections became less of a worry by virtue of this discovery and human safety amidst these microbes became an assurance. However, that safety is already being compromised following human activities that are encouraging microbial resistance to these antibiotics. This resistance now threatens the effective treatment of infections for which antibiotics are developed to target and destroy - a challenge that has become a global worry.
Following research, resistance of microbes to an

Over time Nigeria’s drug market has been described as chaotic. One major contributing factor to the prevalence of fake and substandard medicines in Nigeria is the continued presence of the highly unregulated open drug markets across major cities of the country, where medicines are sold in the open air - on street corners, at kiosks and at stalls. These markets are widely known as sources and conduits for faking medicines in Nigeria and other countries. Notable open drug markets in Nigeria include those located in Lagos (Idumota market), Kano (Sabon-Gari), and Onitsha market.
In a bid to improve on the health of Nigerians and make sure that patent medicine dealers make available to Nigerians quality drugs, and curb drug faking in the country, the Federal Government prohibited the open mark

The concept of Satellite Pharmacy is perhaps a strange phenomenon here in these parts of the world, but as the world becomes a global village Nigeria has no choice than to fall completely in line with what has become a growing norm in the field of pharmaceutical healthcare services. A satellite pharmacy can be described as a pharmacy in an institution which renders specialised services for the patients of the institution and which is dependent upon the centrally located pharmacy for administrative control, staffing, and drug procurement.
Thus there has been an increasing need to foster the idea of satellite pharmacies in the country owing to the challenge posed by how to meet the pharmaceutical needs of Nigerians living especially in underserved/rural areas. But the problems inherent i

Nigeria’s drug market has been described as very chaotic and unorganised. This comment was made by Pharm. Uduogaranya Patrick, Associate Professor, Department of Clinical Pharmacy and Pharmacy Management, University of Nigeria, Nsukka. He made this comment during the 2017 international Pharmacy Preceptor Development Workshop recently held in UNTH, Enugu.
Uduogaranya, who expressed his opinion during an interview with PharmaTimes in Enugu, said “The Nigeria drug market is chaotic and totally disorganised. The situation is not ideal for any pharmacist. While many may say that the industry has provided employment and the rest, I am of the opinion that if the market is well structured it can still do much better. People are dying from certain things, which should not be the case.”
While

Seven days after reports of Lassa fever outbreak at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, LUTH, went viral, one of the three hospital workers infected by the Lassa virus has been discharged. Two other infected patients have been responding to treatment and are likely to be discharged this week even as 60 persons under surveillance have been cleared from the list. Giving this update to Vanguard in a telephone chat yesterday, the Chairman Medical Advisory Committee, CMAC, LUTH, Prof. Olufemi Fasanmade, said the first patient was discharged Sunday after being certified free of the infectious disease.
“We discharged one of them last Sunday and the remaining two will be discharged this week. They are all fine. They will be going home tomorrow (today) or next. After that we won’t have any o

Aggrieved patients receiving treatment at the Edo State Central Hospital yesterday put the hospital’s two gates under lock and key, preventing out-patients and staff from accessing the hospital.
The protesting patients who are women overpowered the only security guard at the gate and padlocked them with their own keys.
Daily Trust learnt that the protest which began at 7am was as a result of robbery attacks in the hospital.
The spokesperson of the protesters, Loveth Ogenekaro, said the patients could no longer tolerate what she described as incessant robbery incidents.
She said, “Last Sunday at t 1am, armed robbers entered the maternity ward through the ceiling and disposed a patient’s relation of N100,000 and three phones. Last week patients at the accident and emergency ward

The Court of Appeal has again affirmed the regulatory powers of the Pharmacists Council of Nigeria (PCN) over pharmaceutical technologists and technicians.
A statement from the Pharmacists Council of Nigeria, yesterday said the appellate court sitting in Calabar, Cross River State, recently dismissed an appeal by the National Association of Pharmaceutical Technologists and Pharmacy Technicians of Nigeria (NAPPTON) and three others seeking to be independent in regulation matters as it relates to its members.
While dismissing the suit in favour of the council, the Court of Appeal, in a unanimous decision, upheld the contention of the respondents that PCN did not breach the fundamental human rights of members of the association, when it sealed shops in Calabar operated by members of the a...